CHICKEN SCRATCH: Who in the world signed my card?

Welcome to another edition of "Chicken Scratch". This is where we take a look at an athlete's signature and give it a sharpie rating based on a scale of 1-5 with 1 being a lazy signature (a horse could sign better with a pen in it's mouth) and then a 5 being a signature of a nice crisp clean legible signature. On very rare occasions we also have a special reserved 6 sharpie salute for perfect signatures.

Today's star athlete signature is brought to you courtesy of Gabriel Arias who's the shortstop of the Cleveland Guardians. This card below I pulled from a blaster of Absolute baseball (from gamestop of all places - it was in the bargain bin) and I was rather most surprised to pull an actual autograph 3 piece jersey card and not just a single piece jersey card as my luck with blasters is not that great.

Let's take a look at some of his signature across other cards (not mine) since the Absolute autograph was on a sticker.

 

So it would seem that he really has to cram his signature style together when he's signing on small areas as opposed to larger signing areas. Some folks do that and some do not while others just make a straight line at times. Look at those loops in his signature when he has the space to write.

His "G" is very consistent and his "A" is as well across the signatures.

It would appear the "G" and "A" in his signature is consistent on a baseball as well.

The ball player appears to take a little time to make his signature appear legible with at least 2 letters. I could see the "G" but I would never guess that his name was Gabriel or his last name was Arias from the "A". Some athletes will take the time to make a nice crisp signature and others will just write out their signature in letters. IMO......Gabriel makes an effort in his signatures with emphasis in the first letters of his first and last name and then scribbles out the rest of his name For this reason....the Big Kahuna and the tribe feel that he will be the receiver of 2 sharpies for his efforts.

Nobody beats "the wiz"- Saturday Swings edition

2016 Diamond Kings Elements of Royalty Ozzie Smith Auto jersey #7/10

CHICKEN SCRATCH: RODNEY HOOD Edition

Today, your eyes will gaze upon the autograph of Rodney Hood who is a shooting guard for the Utah Jazz in the NBA.

 

Every year I buy a few packs of basketball cards just for giggles and when you pull an autograph from that pack it does make you feel like you just won the lotto.......in a small kind of fun way. I pulled this card from a feeder box at target and was literally surprised because the pack didn't seem very thick or heavy. This is a Rodney Hood 2014-15 Panini Excalibur Basketball Rookie Rampage patch auto card serially numbered 21/25.

The first thing that I noticed in Rodney's signature is that he signed his first name with a "Lasso"effect. It's in my opinion that you can make out an "R" if you already knew his name was Rodney. However, when I showed the card to a few friends and asked them for their thoughts on the autograph, their first thought was that it's an "A" more than an "R" that he signed. 

With his last name (Hood), it looks like it's spelled, "Nid" or "Mid". If you look really hard at the card you will see these letters: A N D. So I guess his signature name is "and" perhaps?

Either way Rodney's signature is better than most of the NBA player signatures in the last 5 years and while it may be barely legible the tribe has decided to give him 2 sharpies for his efforts. 

THE TRIBE HAS SPOKEN!

 

"SLAP SHOT" FRIDAY Mats Zuccarello EDITION

Mats Zuccarello

NY RANGERS: Right Wing

Patch card? Says it's a patch card.......Oh Topps.....you fooled me again.

In the hobby world of jersey and patch memorabilia cards, it's always fun to pull or find a low serially numbered patch card. According to some of the manufacturers these patch cards are supposed to have a piece of a jersey number or piece of the name plate or even a piece of the team emblem on them. Some examples of this would be something like this:

or a beauty like this

another fine looking specimen

As beautiful as some of these cards may turn out to be it just so happens every now and then you do get some blunders and stinkers when it comes to pulling these low serially numbered "supposed patch" cards like this 2011 Topps Finest football Bilal Powell card that I pulled that says, "player worn patch" right on the card and it's serially numbered 19/25

What I did get was a plain old jersey swatch. The exposed white on the side of the "patch" window is due to the crooked piece of jersey exposing the sliver of a jersey number or letter.  Somebody in quality control made an oops there. Let's look at another example of a card missing some quality patch materials.

 This was a card that I pulled from out of 2011 Topps Supreme. Adrian Peterson and Maurice Jones-Drew autographed and serially numbered 3/5 game used relic card. Now can you picture this for a minute and visualize with me that would it not be more appropriate for these low numbered cards (especially the Peterson) to specifically have patch pieces instead of just a plain old jersey swatch? However when something is this low numbered I feel it would look ten times better with a piece of patch emblem. Now the yellow swatch could be from the neck line as that is about the only visible yellow that I know of on the vikings jersey and that's cool in its own way in terms of collectible pieces.

If we look at this 2011 Topps Supreme 4 player jersey card serially numbered 9/25 it also another victim of the plain old jersey swatch.

Then we have something like this card:

A 2011 Topps Finest Stevan Ridley rookie autograph player worn patch card serially numbered 354/599. It's just a blue solid patch and I'm not 100% sure but I don't think it's jersey material as it's too heavy of a fabric from the feel of it.

Here's a good example of rather well used patch piece.


While it may be only limited to 49 copies there is some quality patch material that was used in the making of this card. Notice how the patch piece is also more than a "inch cube" of material and almost goes the length of the card and seems to be of multiple colors as well.

Here's another example of a color patch limited to 99 copies:









Sometimes with these patch cards you get the elastic bands from the sleeves or necklines like these cards:







  and my hats off to PANINI for pulling off these cards

You're getting the whole top of the jersey tie!

The manufacturers sometimes need to take a step back and look at how they're producing these cards. No company is exempt from having blunders and mistakes happening in the production/application process.  What it all really comes down to is what you want for your own personal collection and for your own personal amusement. 

Tis the Season to be GIVING AWAY!

It's giveaway time here on "Enough Already". This contest is a special contest. It will require a little work on your part and a little thing called "Honesty and integrity" and little thing called "consideration of others". In order to sign up for this contest you must follow these rules that I have layed out before you-NO EXCUSES:

CONTEST RULES

1. Leave your first name and a comment of any type promoting your blogsite or whatever you feel like letting the world know.

2. Tell your friends and other bloggers about the contest and mention it on your blog.

3. Please pick and do any one of the following letter choices to be entered into the contest:
A. Take 15 canned goods to a food/homeless shelter and donate them.
B. Take 15 canned goods and donate them to a church's pantry for people in need.
C. Take 15 good toys and donate them to the Toys for Tots program.
D. Take 10 good warm wearable coats and donate them to a shelter.
E. Take 30 good presentable wearable clothing items to a shelter.
F. Take 15 Baked good items and Donate them to a food/homeless shelter.
G. Make a donation to the American Diabetes Association
H. Make a donation to the American Cancer Society
I. Donate a pint of Blood or make a donation to the American Red Cross
Here's where it can get fun with a Christmas Bonus: If you do one of these events and include a photo of you doing the event you chose to do you will then be entered for a secret surprise Christmas Bonus prize. If you have a pic then please contact me first and I will send you my email/contact info and then you'll be entered for the Christmas Bonus.

The giveaway prize package will consist of a surprise autographed official mbl baseball player (hint: member of the 500 HR club -no not Gary Sheffield as I will say that much-lol) and 2 other Hall of Fame autographed 8x10 pictures. (HINT): One player is the "most linkable" player in all of baseball history! (HINT 2): Both players are on the 100 Greatest Players of Baseball by The Sporting News. Also included is a package of 100+ varieties of refractor cards of various baseball and football stars and rookies. HOT rookie cards from Football and Baseball. A special Tim Tebow Topps Chrome rookie refractor card and a few other Christmas surprises (we're not telling you everything that's included cause it's CHRISTMAS for pete's sake! As Rod could tell you as he was my last contest winner, here at Enough Already- we like to give generously and surprisingly! Dave from First and Goal can attest to this as well! So can Marie from her blog! By the way...the Prize package....it will be shipped UPS.

Things to remember:
1. Follow the rules of the contest to be officially entered!
2. Deadline for Entry is December 24, 2010 @ 11:59pm
3. Contestants will be listed in no particular order and Random.org will select the winner.
4. Contest winner will be drawn on the afternoon of Christmas Day.

We enjoy giving things away here at "Enough Already". With a little help from you and me let's give to those who need a helping hand.

It would be nice if Reps from the card companies (UD, Topps, Panini) would take place in the card contest by donating additional prizes or matching to the charities!

Holy Cow!!! 10,000 VIEWS!

My blog has officially recorded over 10,000 views. I am simply amazed at this because I wouldn't have never expected to see that many people reading my ol' boring site/blog. For those that do I say, "Thank You" and I encourage you to continue to fight the good fight and spread the word at just how bad PANINI really is this year. Would someone please donate some ideas for them. Perhaps if we posted a sign that said, "Listen to the collectors and they will come", they might actually see improvements........Yeah..........and I have 10,000 yen. Perhaps the man on the yen should use his stick on PANINI and teach them how to do cards "THE RIGHT WAY". However, on a serious side.....Thanks guys for the support!